No Country for Women - Humanism, Secularism, Feminism

Taslima Nasreen

Taslima Nasreen, an award-winning writer, physician, secular humanist and human rights activist, is known for her powerful writings on women oppression and unflinching criticism of religion, despite forced exile and multiple fatwas calling for her death. In India, Bangladesh and abroad, Nasreen’s fiction, nonfiction, poetry and memoir have topped the best-seller’s list.

Taslima Nasreen was born in Bangladesh. She started writing when she was 13. Her writings won the hearts of people across the border and she landed with the prestigious literary award Ananda from India in 1992. Taslima won The Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought from the European Parliament in 1994. She received the Kurt Tucholsky Award from Swedish PEN, the Simone de Beauvoir Award and Human Rights Award from Government of France, Le Prix de l' Edit de Nantes from the city of Nantes, France, Academy prize from the Royal Academy of arts, science and literature from Belgium. She is a Humanist Laureate in The International Academy for Humanism,USA. She won Distinguished Humanist Award from International Humanist and Ethical Union, Free-thought Heroine award from Freedom From Religion foundation, USA., IBKA award, Germany,and Feminist Press Award, USA . She got the UNESCO Madanjeet Singh prize for Promotion of the Tolerance and Non-violence in 2005. She received the Medal of honor of Lyon. She got honorary citizenship from Paris, Nantes, Lyon, Metz, Thionville, Esch etc. Taslima was awarded the Condorcet-Aron Prize at the “Parliament of the French Community of Belgium” in Brussels and Ananda literary award again in 2000.

Bestowed with honorary doctorates from Gent University and UCL in Belgium, and American University of Paris and Paris Diderot University in France, she has addressed gatherings in major venues of the world like the European Parliament, National Assembly of France, Universities of Sorbonne, Oxford, Harvard, Yale, etc. She got fellowships as a research scholar at Harvard and New York Universities. She was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow in the USA in 2009.

Taslima has written 40 books in Bengali, which includes poetry, essays, novels and autobiography series. Her works have been translated in thirty different languages. Some of her books are banned in Bangladesh. Because of her thoughts and ideas she has been banned, blacklisted and banished from Bengal, both from Bangladesh and West Bengal part of India. She has been prevented by the authorities from returning to her country since 1994, and to West Bengal since 2007.

EVENTS

I am not in favor of capital punishment. I think that every human being has a right to live. Every war criminal should get a fair trial. That instead of hanging they are given any other punishment. Life term, maybe? Why not? Nowadays though, I object even to life term. I do not like the idea of jails. Jails can be correctional centres. Criminals can stay in those centres until their brains get debugged and freed from malice. A person once suggested, “The jail rooms can be classrooms, and the each jail a university.” Sometime ago, some jails in Sweden were shut down because they had no inmates. The number of crimes is less, so the number of criminals is few. The more society is rid of inequality, the more uniformity there is amongst people, the more there is reduction in crime. Well, that is Sweden. Bangladesh is still not civilized, so we cannot dream about doing away with our jails yet. I’ll talk about something else.
The human rights organizations of the world are animadverting about the death penalty in Bangladesh. Let them. They always say, “Revoke the capital punishment law,” to all the countries of the world which has this law. But my question is, those countries which continue to maintain this law, and frequently mete out death sentence themselves, why are they shedding tears about this law in Bangladesh? Do they pounce on other countries in this manner, or beat their chests crying, when those countries happen to give death sentences? Do they go and sit in obstinate protest at the doors of China or Saudi Arabia or Iran or the US or South Korea? You don’t see them at all when others in Bangladesh are hanged. Then am I to understand that they wailing because this is related to Quader Molla’s or Mir Quasem’s hanging? Is it because Quader Molla or Mir Quasem are radicals? You can kill whoever you like, but you can’t touch Islamic fundamentalists! Why don’t they say Molla or Quasem are war criminals? The grief that various countries express when murderers of the 1971 Liberation War are put on trial really astounds me. The pernicious forces of Islamic fundamentalism have many allies in today’s world.
The Western countries which we thought were enemies of Islam; they also display extraordinary sympathy towards these radicals. I really don’t want to think what the political reasons are behind supporting fundamentalism. The group of Western countries which do so, do not want to accept the ’71 Liberation War as a war at all. As if war in a poor country is no war at all, the death of 30 lakh people is no death at all, the rape of two lakh women is no rape at all. As if our famines, our hunger, our poverty and illiteracy are the only things real. Our language, our songs, our love, our personalities, our struggles, our valor, our desires and expectations, dreams, are not real, not valuable.
I’ll say why I do not believe in the death sentence. No creature or human being is born a criminal or a terrorist. If a child is not given a healthy, beautiful, educated environment, if a lot of garbage is incessantly poured into his brain while he is growing up, then such a child will involve himself in criminality and terrorism as an adult. Is it his fault? Or is it the fault of those who pour that garbage, keep alive that custom of pouring garbage in society! Living in the same society I am against fundamentalism, Quader Molla and Mir Quasem and Delwar Hossain Sayeedi are fundamentalists, some are murderers, rapists, thieves; others are honest, virtuous. Although we live in the same society, this happens because of difference in education. One section of the population is acquiring education in science, obtaining knowledge about human rights, getting enlightened. Another section is being created as religious fanatics, illiterates, bigots and barbarians who are left plunged in extreme darkness. If the education system was equal for everyone, if the education was a healthy one, if it was an equal rights education, then instead of being bad, people would have been good. Despite small instances of incivility, discourtesy and minor crimes, the society would not have gone into the hands of rotten elements, and lakhs and lakhs of people would not have been dancing in the streets mad with murderous intent. I start with fright when a few people from foreign countries cry for Quader Molla and Mir Quasem but what about the people of my country who have gone absolutely crazy with love for Quader and Quasem? Every one of them is a Quader Molla or Mir Quasem. One Quader or one Quasem has been hanged for war crimes, but then thousands and thousands of other Quaders or Quasems are beheading scientific-minded anti-radical people —what are we going to do about them? These lakhs and lakhs of Islamic fundamentalists are undoubtedly much more dangerous than a handful of decrepit, old war criminals already at their death’s door. Each of these fundamentalists is a soldier who wants to turn war criminal Molla’s dream into reality.
A country where food, clothing, shelter, education is not available for everyone, there is bound to be anarchy. Like every other system, the judicial system is also is defective. That is why, whenever there is a crime, the reason for the crime is not investigated; and without giving any thought to why those mistakes were committed, without making any effort to rectify those mistakes, people are thrown into prison and killed. The government wants prompt solution to many problems by quick hanging.
But this does not provide genuine solution to problems. I think of the future, we need an end to the malignant forces of fundamentalism. It cannot be terminated by hangings; it has to be terminated by good education.
To free society from religious fanaticism, superstition and misogyny, we have to educate people from childhood on science, humanism, equal rights. If children get this kind of education, then there is no fear of them turning into bigots, rapists and murderers.
I am not surprised to see the hideous barbarism that the members of Jamaat-e-Islami are perpetrating in Bangladesh. I know for a long time that although Jamaat-e-Islami is recognized as a political party, it is nothing more than a terrorist outfit. They practice the politics of hatred, discrimination, blindness, misery, crippling and killing. If this kind of politics is allowed to enter into society, it will destroy the people, the nation, and future of the nation. Jamaat-e-Islami should be banned for the right reasons. Terrorist outfits are outlawed in all countries. But a lot of people will generally rush in lamenting and try to stop it if you try to do such a thing in Bangladesh. The party which does not believe in democracy, we will keep that party alive in the name of democracy, and they will gleefully cut your nose and slit my throat — we all know that. Despite knowing it, others pretend not to be aware of it, but I do not do that. Within the country and abroad, there is enough desire among people to render Bangladesh into an undeveloped, illiterate, radicalized nation crammed with religious fundamentalists. And although I believe totally in the freedom of expression, I want to ban a political party, because Jamaat-e-Islami does not deserve to be recognized as one.
Almost all the war criminals are Muslim fundamentalists. I am a great enemy of radical war criminals and radical Islamists. For twenty years they have been keeping on sharpening their knives for me. They will kill me the moment they find me anywhere near them. In spite of this knowledge, I do not want them to be hanged. I want them to be good individuals. I want their children to be on the side of progress. I want the children of their children to not know what narrow religious fundamentalism is. I want everyone to live in a classless, equal, unsuperstitious, beautiful environment. I wish all the people and all the children of my country to have that. My struggle is for that dream. I will not be able to see that society where equality reigns within my lifespan. But I want to leave a small role for myself in the construction of a healthy society. That is why I am risking my life to write and inspire people to take up that fight. The country which does not feel like my country anymore, the country which I am ashamed of today — I want future generations to be proud of that country. Not proud of having blood on the streets, but proud of having a safe and secure nation.

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The practice of marriage was started to establish the certainty of fatherhood. This is what was required — a virgin body untouched by man, a body which can only sleep with the husband and no one else, a body which only the husband will touch and no one else, a female body which only the husband can impregnate to carry his child and give birth to his child — his male child. His male child will continue his line of descent, will inherit his wealth. It is women who help men to keep alive their androcratic system by marrying them. If they did not help in this way, androcracy and patriarchy would have been buried long ago.
To make sure that women’s bodies do not come in close contact with other men, a process was followed to imprison them and use them as personal possessions. The name of this was marriage. Marriage was the license from the family and society to establish a sexual relationship.
I have seen in Bengali society that after marriage it is the women’s wings which are clipped, not the men’s. Most women have to go live in their in-law’s home. Attach the husband’s surname to her name. They have to leave their own homes, families, relatives, friends, environs, neighbors, cities, towns, villages — everything. Even if the woman is an adult, even if she is educated, where she will go and what she will do, who she will mix with or won’t, whether she will work or not, those decisions are taken by the husband and his family. It was common practice before, and still is now that women cannot work in an office after marriage. It is better to stay at home and be faithful to your husband. Do domestic labor, serve the in-laws, bring up children.
Times have changed. Women are not literally imprisoned at home. But they have an invisible chain around their ankles. They are allowed to go out to work. But their earnings are taken away to finance the family. Polishing your shoes, serving you food, washing your clothes — any old illiterate girl can do such work. But if your beautiful, educated, sexual partner does that, then you feel mighty pleased.
The salaried domestic help will spout venom and leave if everything doesn’t go to her liking. But the unsalaried domestic help, your wife — you can do whatever you want, but she won’t leave her job. The job of being a wife. Back-breaking labor. No salary. No holidays. No pension. She will give you dowry money, and she will also become your slave. People buy things with money. Women give money to sell themselves.
Let me talk about the dowry system today. This is no recent phenomenon; it is a few thousand years old. This practice was there in many countries, it still exists in many parts of the world today, albeit illegally. This practice is rampant in the entire Sub-Continent. It cannot be stopped despite formulating anti-dowry laws, despite meting out punishment. Thousands of wives are being killed, thousand others are committing suicide for being dishonored and insulted for it. As far as I know, this custom has been in practice from ancient times in this region. But some ancient travelers have written in their books that they have not seen anyone giving dowry for marriage in India. Maybe the system of dowry was not as terrible then as it is today, or maybe they never saw such an exchange actually taking place. The king of ancient Greece Alexander the Great never saw dowry in Indian marriages. The Persian intellectual Al-Beruni came to India in 1017 and lived here for sixteen years. In his autobiography he has described Indian marriages, but there is no sign of dowry there either.
The system of dowry in ancient times was not a one-sided affair. It was given from the bride’s side to the groom, and from the groom’s side to the bride. Dowry from the groom’s side was given to the bride’s family as compensation for reduction of a working member in her family, while what was given from the bride’s side to the groom’s family was the inheritance she was entitled to. Women were deprived by law from direct inheritance in those days.
The inheritance laws of the modern age do not deprive women. Daughters get a share of their parents’ property. In all the countries within the Sub-Continent, dowry is prohibited. But these prohibitory laws cannot stop the practice of dowry. The more women descend, the more dowries ascend. To put it exactly, the more women’s position is lowered in society, the more the dowry amount gets higher. This increase and decrease remains in the hands of patriarchs.
Bride-torturing and bride-burning have assumed dreadful proportions in India. It is the same in Bangladesh. Most bride-killings are passed off as suicide. Most bride-tortures are reported as quarrels between husband and wife attributable to the latter’s extra-marital affairs.
In Bengali Muslim marriages, there is a custom of giving den mohor¹ from the groom to the bride, but I have grave doubts whether it is at all given. But from the bride’s side the groom and his family has to be given dowry money, houses, cars, furniture etc. etc. If these are not given, or if there is delay in giving them, then the bride has to endure unspeakable torture. The relationship between a husband and wife has to be one of love and trust. But dowry has destroyed this relationship. For men this relationship is now of money and selfishness, for women it is of sacrifice and working without wages. In India the brides are burnt alive, in Bangladesh that practice is not there — brides are either axed or poisoned to death.
Women have to stop marrying those vile, selfish, small men who are greedy for dowry. It is better to live alone than stay in the households of such men. Some women think that if they give more dowries the husband’s torture will be less. This has been proved to be wrong. More dowries you give, more the greed gets inflamed, resulting in more torture. Men of all sections are dowry-greedy. From the penniless to the croprepatis². The men are not yet thinking of women as fellow-passengers and colleagues with equal rights. They are still thinking that women are not completely human, and even if they are, they are ‘less human’. Until this wicked thought is abolished, women will have to suffer on earth. There is no such discrimination between the male and female genders of any species other than that of the human being. When will the time ever come that the human race will feel ashamed?

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Last Friday, I got a death threat again. It came from Ansar Khilafah, an ISIS-oriented militant group, in Kerala. If a group has the name of ISIS attached to it, or has an ISIS touch to it, I fear, they must be experts in hacking.
I often gently touch my neck, also put my hand behind my head, trying to understand what would be the feeling when they stab me from behind, or hack me. Maybe it would be better if they shot me in my head. I have suffered a lot in life, don’t want to suffer in death. Death should be quick. But will they listen to me? I can’t imagine requesting them, begging for life. Instead, I should think I would close my eyes and sing some of my favorite Rabindra sangeets to lessen the pain while being hacked. I don’t know if you can lessen any pain like that, but I don’t have any other option.
I was trying to understand what those 19-20-year-olds were doing when they were being hacked. Were they trying to save their lives, screaming? Did they try to snatch the weapons? There were so many people inside the cafe, I don’t know why all of them together could not attack, defeat the militants? Maybe they thought a rescue team would come to save them, police would come, Army would come. Maybe they were waiting. If I were to wait for someone who would save me from the killers, how would be those minutes, hours — the six hours, the 12 hours? The pistol-gun-dagger-knife-toting killers are parading in front of me and I am waiting. They can behead, shoot me any time, and I am waiting. I shiver to think, my throat goes dry. At the Dhaka cafe, nobody came to their rescue even after 12 hours. Those who were supposed to were waiting outside. Why were they just waiting outside? I don’t know. After three hours had passed, Tarishi Jain’s father was speaking on a local television channel. He was anxious, was saying his daughter was inside the cafe. He was wondering why rescue operation hadn’t started. If those who were supposed to rescue the people really knew how and when to carry out the job, many lives could have been saved.
Also Read: At Tarishi’s funeral, a photograph tells the story
I was thinking about Faraaz Hossain. He had been allowed to go, but he didn’t want to leave without his friends. He wanted his friends to be freed too. And since his friends weren’t freed, he didn’t accept the freedom for himself. I am such a sensitive person, I think about people’s welfare all the time, can say I have dedicated my life for this cause, but even I believe if a herd of murderers gave me a safe passage I would escape from the mayhem, without looking back; I would run without waiting for anybody. Everybody would run (in such a situation). Only Faraaz didn’t. Faraazs are perhaps born only once in a century.

The militants got what they wanted. They wanted to shake the world, they did. They wanted to earn Punya (virtuousness) by killing non-Muslims, maybe they succeeded in that too. How were they able to hack so many people, so many young boys and girls? They hadn’t hacked anyone before, how could they hack not one or two but 20 people? In reality, a belief can make people do many impossible things. I don’t know who brainwashed the militants, but whatever was fed into their brains, they believed without asking any question. A lot like the two Boston bomber brothers from Chechenia. They looked smart but didn’t have the ability to intellectually and rationally (logically) consider anything. Religion is truth, the religious book is truth. The religious book was written by the creator himself, so whatever is written there needs to be blindly followed. No questions, just acceptance. As a result, they have literally accepted everything written in the religious text from the beginning to end (without paying heed to any sensory perception). They didn’t try to interpret the ancient text in contemporary context. If it said non-believers should be killed, they just understood non-believers should be killed, they didn’t try to interpret the meaning in any other way.
In a society blinded by religion, brainwashing starts right after birth. These people have been hearing the praise of their religion since birth, at home, in schools, colleges, at playgrounds, in trains, buses, on television, radio and in movies and plays. They have been told following religion takes you to heaven, and if you don’t follow religion you face the extreme punishment of hell. (They have been told) your religious book has the solution to all problems of the world, religion is knowledge, religion is science and religion is peace. If you hear something all the time, it becomes part of your subconscious. The base (foundation) remains prepared, you can easily build a palace of belief on it.
Man has always preferred the easy solutions found in religion to science’s continuous research and complicated equations (mathematics). Religion, hence, attracts every one — from illiterate daily-wagers to university scholars. Because understanding science is not as easier as understanding religion.

Terrorists have been for a long time now hacking to death atheists, seculars, rational writer-bloggers, homosexuals, progressive students and teachers, Hindus, Buddhists and Christians. Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has never expressed grief for any such deaths. She has let the killers safely exit the country. She did not bring to justice any of the murderers. She never arrested any of the killers. She did not punish anyone. On the contrary, (she) punished atheist bloggers, sending them behind the bars. She has spoken against freethinking. She has made rules against the right to freedom of expression. For the murder of freethinkers, she has blamed the freethinkers alone. Why did she feel like expressing grief for those who died at the Dhaka cafe? There must be a big politics behind this. Those who were hacked to death at the Dhaka cafe were children of the rich and influential. Was that the reason? Or was it because the world was watching what Hasina would do after a terrorist attack in the city?
Actually, politicians are hypocrites. Will accept what is convenient in the religion, not the rest — it is the Muslims with this mentality who are hypocrites. In fact, those militants were not hypocrites. Whatever they were brainwashed to say, they uttered like mechanised puppets. They didn’t think about their life, they had come that night knowing they would die, believed they were going to heaven. Somebody told them, taught them they would get the reward of jihad, a place in the highest heaven if they killed non-Muslims. After hacking to death the foreigners, displaying the height of atrocity, they told their Muslim countrymen in the morning, ‘we are here only to kill the non-Muslims. We won’t kill you. You all (the Muslims) can leave. We are going to heaven anyways’.
You cannot uproot terrorism by killing terrorists. You need to uproot terrorism at source to end terrorism.

On Friday morning, I got the news that a terrorist organisation called Ansarul Khilafa from Kerala owing allegiance to the Islamic State (IS) had issued a death threat against me on its Facebook page. By the evening, I got the news of the attack by Islamic terrorists in a Dhaka cafe. I was worried for my life for a while. But then, my concerns turned to the lives of the hostages at the Holey Artisan Bakery.
Bangladesh has already become an Islamic fundamentalist nation. Atheists, secularists, rationalists, bloggers, professors, students, homosexuals, Shias, Ahmadiyas, Hindus, Buddhists and Christians are being hacked to death by Islamic terrorists. They kill without fear because the government hardly takes any action against the perpetrators.

Guilty Until Proven Guilty

Instead, victims get threatened by the government. The latter accuses freethinkers of hurting the religious sentiments of Muslims. This is an overt endorsement of the danse macabre conducted on a regular basis by Islamic obscurantists.
Section 57 of Bangladesh’s Information and Communication Technology Act, 2006 — that allows the arrest without a warrant of any person who “deliberately publishes any material in electronic form that causes to deteriorate law and order, prejudice the image of the state or person or causes to hurt religious belief” — was introduced for one simple purpose: to gag freedom of expression.
Many bloggers left Bangladesh out of fear. Many stopped expressing their views. No critical analysis of Islam or even Islamic fundamentalism is possible in Bangladesh any more.
The terrorists at the Dhaka café were 20-25 years old. They were not poor, not illiterate. Heavily indoctrinated in Islam, they shouted ‘Allahu Akbar’ while slaughtering people. Those who could recite a Koranic verse were spared. The others were tortured and hacked to death with machetes.

Those terrorists have nothing but religion. They behaved well with hostages in hijab and hacked non-hijabis — including two Bangladeshi Muslim women, Ishrat Akhand and Abinta Kabir — to death. Faraz Hussain, a Bangladesh-born US citizen, was also among the dead. Tarushi Jain, a 19-year-old University of California student from India, was hacked to death.
Twenty-eight people were killed, among them 20 were foreigners. Young men have been brainwashed with Islam at home, madrasas and mosques. They have been fed the belief that non-believers, non-Muslims and critics of Islam should be exterminated.
By killing them, they are successfully taught, they will go to heaven. They have also been taught that ‘jihad’ is mandatory for every Muslim and Muslims should turn Darul Harb (the Land of the Enemy) into Darul Islam (the Land of Islam).
There is no point trying to confuse the issue by saying that poverty, frustration, lack of jobs and the absence of hope force people to become terrorists.
It is the other way around. We are often seeing rich and literate, highly qualified professionals becoming terrorists. They join the IS because they know they will be at liberty to do whatever they wish to do, sanctioned to rape and kill and torture.
Many organisations and institutions in Bangladesh have been funded by Islamic fundamentalists from rich Arab countries for decades. Already, madrasas and mosques are breeding grounds for Islamic fundamentalists.
Islamisation in Bangladesh started not long after its creation in 1971. It is tragic that Bangladesh, whose very birth was based on secularism and the rejection of the ‘two-nation’ theory, has degenerated into an Islamic fundamentalist country. And the government is to blame for its wilful failure to contain fundamentalism.

My Way or Fly Away

In the early 1990s, when I was attacked by Islamic fundamentalists, a fatwa was issued against me, a price set on my head, hundreds of thousands of Muslim fundamentalists took to the street demanding my execution, the intellectuals remained silent. Instead of
cracking down on the fundamentalists, the government filed a case against me on the charges of hurting the religious feelings of people.
I was forced to leave the country. That was the beginning of what today’s Bangladesh is: full of religionists, fundamentalists, hijabis, burqawalis, an atavistic medieval country.
Without allowing the criticism of Islam, it will be difficult for Muslim countries to separate the state and religion, to make personal laws based on equality, to have a secular education. And if this does not happen, Muslim countries will remain in darkness forever, breeding people indoctrinated by religion to not tolerate any differences, and where women will never enjoy the right to live as complete human beings.
People like to believe that Islam is a religion of peace. I, however, have witnessed the opposite since my childhood.
The time has come for people to tell the truth and listen to it without equivocating: Islam and Islamic fundamentalism don’t have so many differences. Islam isn’t compatible with democracy, human rights, women’s rights, freedom of expression.
You will not be able to kill terrorism by killing terrorists. You have to kill its root cause. You have to stop brainwashing children with religion.
It is every sane person’s duty to make insane people sane.
But in the present scenario, the voice of sanity is a cry in wilderness. This has to be changed. Good and sensible people must speak up. Because the silence of the good is the strength of the bad.

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Since 2013, more than 20 people – including secular writers, bloggers, professors, members of religious minorities and foreigners – have been killed in targeted attacks in Bangladesh. Why are secular individuals being targeted in Bangladesh? Who is killing them?

Jihadists have been silencing or threatening voices of sanity because democracy and pluralism are anathema to them. All they want is to establish a theocracy. They want to create Darul Islam, the land of Islam in Bangladesh. They want no law but Sharia, no women’s rights, and no freedom of speech. They want group loyalty perforce, which has no space for freedom of thought. There are 148 jihadi training camps in Bangladesh. Jihadists are helped by Jamat-e-Islami, 132 Islamic terrorist organizations including Ansarullah Bangla team and 231 fundamentalist institutions including ‘Islami bank’. In the last 40 years, almost 40 thousand crores takas have been used for the military training of Jihadists in Bangladesh. It is only 20% of total profits that was earned from the Islamic fundamentalists’ economy. It is well established that the Islami bank has been financing terrorism.

Six years ago when Bangladesh restored secularism in its constitution, it seemed it was on a progressive path. What happened in the last few years that there is such violent reaction against secularism? Has the trial and conviction of 1971 Jamat-e-Islami war criminals in Bangladesh triggered this violence?

If that were so, Islamists would have attacked the judges or people in positions of power. But Islamists have been killing atheist bloggers, critics of Islam, intellectuals, and progressive Muslims. Islamists can kill anyone they want with impunity, and it becomes possible because the country has been Islamized for the last few decades because the government is not only a mute spectator but also directly encouraging the Islamists by criticizing bloggers for hurting the sentiments of people. This is bizarre, unthinkable in a society governed by rule of law. It seems that Bangladesh is hurtling back to the medieval age.

What is the extent of religious extremism in Bangladesh? Can ISIS find support there? How is Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fighting religious fundamentalist forces?

All of the terrorists and fundamentalists of the country support ISIS. Many received training from ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Sheikh Hasina denies this because of political compulsions. The denial is facile and nothing short of political skullduggery. The killings of atheists and bloggers punch holes in her claims. Islamists once attacked her with grenades. However, out of political compulsions she prefers to forget about it under imposed amnesia. Instead of proclaiming she is actually a secular person, she says she is a deeply religious person. There is a competition among political leaders as to who is more religious. Politicians use religion to get votes from the ignorant masses. Sheikh Hasina created the Ulema League in her party, the Awami League. The Ulema League is the organization of Islamic fundamentalists. Members of this organization are not different from the Jamat-e-Islami goons. They support the killing of freethinkers and atheist bloggers in the country.

India is stigmatized by 1984 anti-Sikh violence, 1990 ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri Pandits, 2002 Gujarat riots. According to Indian government’s own admission, communal intolerance and violence has gone up in the last couple of years in India too. Three rationalists were killed last year and two Muslim boys lynched to death. How is India’s majoritarian violence against minorities different from Bangladesh?

Islamic fundamentalists have systematically targeted Minorities in Bangladesh. Hindus are harassed, tortured, and even killed only because they are Hindus. Hindu girls are getting raped, and Hindu-hating Muslims forcibly takes lands owned by Hindus. Hindus are frequently told to leave the country. In 1947, Hindu population in Bangladesh was 31%. Now it is around 8%.
I do not think Muslims in India are oppressed the way Hindus are oppressed in Bangladesh. Hindu extremists hate Indian Muslims but the Indian Constitution is secular which guarantees equality before law and the equal protection of law to all irrespective of religion, caste, sex, place of birth etc., and the laws are applied uniformly, which protect Muslims. Muslims in India are given lots of facilities and opportunities to get education and jobs for being Muslims. The population of Hindus is currently less in Bangladesh because of the exodus that started since the partition of India. Hindus do not fight back in Bangladesh, but in India Muslims often fight back against their oppression. It can happen only if you have equality.
In India, all politicians appease Muslims. In Bangladesh there is no such thing as minority appeasement policy. Hindus are leaving Bangladesh for other countries to save their lives. Muslims in India do not need to leave their country.

Pakistan is fighting Islamists too. How is Bangladesh’s situation any different from Pakistan’s?

Bangladesh was born as a secular country; its constitution was secular. Pakistan is an Islamic republic. But Bangladesh, once a secular state, is now degenerating into a country of Islamists. Because of the Islamization of Bangladesh for 40 long years, its political system is now totally Islamic. You will not find many Muslim countries with political systems as Islamized as is the case in Bangladesh. Islamic fanatics have killed so many secular writers and bloggers and freethinkers in recent years. Not a single killer has been punished. But the Islamic fanatic who killed secular and progressive Salman Taseer in Pakistan was hanged. You can get at least some justice in Pakistan, but not in Bangladesh, which has become a safe haven for Islamists. Even Syria and Iraq are not as accommodating of Islamic fanatics as Bangladesh. No air raid or drone attacks disturb Bangladeshi jihadists. The government of Bangladesh is providing them with protection and has warned atheists and free thinker bloggers to quit writing about atheism and secularism and stop hurting religious feelings. Atheists are getting arrested under 57 ICT acts, a new law which was created to fight free thought.

All three states that emerged from the partition of Indian subcontinent seem to be challenged by the same communal conflicts that our freedom fighters were fighting through the 1940s. Was Partition a good idea to begin with? How has creation of Bangladesh helped?

Partition was a mistake. Now India has two neighbours dominated by Islamic fundamentalists. The 1971 Bangladesh-Pakistan war proved that Muslim unity was a myth and the two-nation theory was a blunder. Bangladesh could not remain as a secular state due to the Islamic policies that were introduced by corrupt political regimes. Bangladesh is becoming the worst Islamic country in the world. Having a neighbour like Bangladesh is not good for India. You never know when the ISIS and al-Qaeda and other Islamic terrorist organizations will come to India and begin killing innocent people. Bangladesh is totally a failed state. The so-called democratic government is a theocratic government in reality. The creation of Bangladesh as a secular state has failed miserably. Bangladesh has become a breeding ground for terrorists.

You have been very critical of Indian liberals and the Left. Why?

I have always been critical of far right politics. I am also critical of Indian liberals and leftists. I noticed liberals and leftists are generally very critical of Hindu fanaticism but not of Islamic fanaticism. Islamic fanatics are against human rights, women’s rights, free speech and democracy. The truth is those Islamic fanatics are against everything Indian liberals stand for. But liberals strangely sympathize with them. This is how they have distorted the concept of secularism.

You have been opposed to all religions? Don’t you think criticism of religion is unnecessarily provoking even moderate religionists to take hardliner positions?

I do not think so. Freethinkers, rationalists, atheists, humanists are a minority in most societies. Moderate religionists do not need criticism of religion to become hardliners. They have political reasons to become hardliners. Criticism of religion should hopefully provoke people to think rationally and give up irrational blind faith. We must not forget that without criticism of religion no society has evolved and no state becomes secular. Critical scrutiny of religion is necessary for a healthy society. No religion should be protected from critical scrutiny, from questioning unethical aspects of its doctrines. Criticism encourages people to become secular humanists.
Hardliners have been killing atheists and rationalists in Bangladesh. They became hardliners because they were indoctrinated with Islam from a very early age, and they sorely need to be exposed to a rational and tolerant worldview.

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Rezaul Karim Siddiguee was hacked to death by Islamists yesterday in Bangladesh. He was not an atheist blogger. He was a professor of English at Rajshahi University. He was involved in cultural activities. He played sitar and puboished literary magazines. He was of course a progressive man.

It is not easy to find atheist bloggers in Bangladesh. Because atheists left the country out of fear. Some are hiding. Stop writing. So, islamists killed a progressive student in Dhaka a few days ago, now they killed a progressive teacher in Rajshahi.

Muhammad killed poets. Asma Bint Marwan was killed for criticizing Muhammad in her poetry in 624. Rezaul Karim Siddiquee was killed by followers of Muhammad for writing poems or publishing literary magaizines, or playing sitar or for being a freethinker in 2016.

I am not surprised. Killers are Muslims. They have the right to practice Islam or follow the orders or advices of Allah and Muhammad in a country where state religion is Islam and where almost everybody believes that Islam means peace and nobody has the right to do any unislamic things. Rezaul Karim opened a music school in his village, that was a non Islamic act. Writing poetry,playing sitar are also non Islamic.

Islamists killed some other progressive professors of Rajshahi University. Islamists will continue killing all the secular progressive people in Bangladesh. Government will say nothing against the killers. No action will be taken against them. Bangladesh is Becoming a killing field.